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Sneak Preview: Nostalgia for the Light

Sundance Institute
Thursday, April 7th, 2011

Patricio Guzmán is a Chilean documentary film director internationally renowned for films such as The Battle of Chile and Salvador Allende. Guzmán’s relationship with Sundance Institute Documentary Film Program goes back to 1998, when he was awarded support for his documentary film The Pinochet Case, a story investigating Augusto Pinochet for crimes against humanity. One decade later, in 2008, Sundance Institute Documentary Film Program was delighted to be able to support this exceptional international artist again, as the first North American support with a grant award for his new feature documentary Nostalgia for the Light.

The uniquely arid conditions of Chile’s Atacama Desert make it an ideal location for both viewing the night sky through its crystal clear atmosphere and hunting for indigenous artifacts, perfectly preserved in its dry earth. But the astronomers and archeologists are not the only ones at work in the Atacama, which has become a pilgrimage site, of sorts, for the relatives of political prisoners who sift the sands for remains that were dumped in the desert by the Pinochet regime, which operated a death camp in the region. Through interviews and images, illuminating and haunting, Guzmán builds subtle, surprising links between these seekers in the stars and sands. The result is an emotionally compelling and intellectually dazzlingly meditation on our constantly shifting relationship with the past.

This feature documentary was supported by the Sundance Institute Documentary Film Program and premiered at the 2010 Cannes Film Festival. UCLA Film & Television Archive, the UCLA Latin American Institute, and the UCLA Department of Spanish and Portuguese will be presenting a sneak preview of Patricio Guzmán's film: